Is the Kenilworth bridge a truck trap?
The century-old rail bridge is shorter than the tallest transport trucks. So why do drivers attempt it?
Some call them “can-opener” bridges.
The name makes more sense after you watch a four-metretall transport truck try — and fail — to squeeze under a Kenilworth Avenue North rail bridge that turns out to be a hand’s span too short.
Photos and videos of trucks wedged under the east-end underpass regularly show up on social media, prompting commuter venting and internet scorn.
Local transport truck owneroperator Erik Raymond — who for the record, has never “kissed the bridge” himself — estimates an inexperienced or inattentive driver gets stuck on Kenilworth as often as twice a month.
Maybe they miss the low clearance warning signs, he suggested, or underestimate the height of their own vehicles. “You’ll see a lot of drivers make the mistake and manage to sneak back out OK,” he told The Spectator after commenting on the latest “stuck truck” photo online earlier this week.
“But I have seen trucks go through and practically tear the roof right off the trailer ... The bridge is always going to win.”
That 105-year-old CN bridge across Kenilworth is likely Hamilton’s best and busiest candidate for the can-opener moniker — although with 3.8metres in clearance, it is still not the city’s squeeziest underpass.
There are 18 bridges scattered across the city that are shorter than the tallest modern transport truck, with the shortest — including another crash-prone candidate, New Mountain Road — offering a measly 3.5metres of vehicle headroom. (The provincial clearance standard today is 4.8 metres, while the maximum allowable truck height is 4.15 metres.)
It’s hard to say exactly how many trucks get stuck under low-clearance bridges in Hamilton because the city only tracks collisions serious enough to cause damage or spur a police response.
Sometimes, a stuck transport driver can escape unaided by releasing air from the tires or suspension system to regain precious inches of clearance.
Still, the city has recorded 44 truck collisions with bridges over the past decade — and all of those spurred mandatory safety inspections, said city asset manager Erika Waite.
Two “higher profile” bridge crashes were on Kenilworth, in 2015 and 2018, with both requiring repairs underneath the bridge to ensure the safety of trains above and motorists below.
The city posts warning signs at all low-clearance bridges to try to stave off crashes. Drivers also risk fines if they stray off designated truck routes — and the Kenilworth underpass is not a legal shortcut for 18-wheelers.
Most trucks get stuck under bridges because of driver inexperience or “risk-taking,” said Jim Campbell, an operations manager with the Ontario Truck Driving School.
Maybe a driver relies on the wrong mapping tool, uses an unfamiliar vehicle or is fooled by a repaved road that is actually higher than advertised on an old bridge-warning sign, he said.
But every “properly trained” and licensed AZ truck driver has access to maps or specialized apps that identify both legal truck routes and low-clearance bridges, Campbell noted.
So why don’t we just fix the old bridges?
It’s rarely that simple — and sometimes impossible, said Waite. The majority of lowslung structures in Hamilton are rail bridges built decades before provincial height standards even existed — and raising a train bridge usually means changing the grade of kilometres’ worth of railroad.
The city spent millions rebuilding drainage infrastructure under the Kenilworth bridge in 2015 to prevent vehicle-trapping floods — another oft-photographed underpass disaster. But that very drainage problem prevented the city from improving clearance heights for motorists.
Two low-slung Birch Avenue rail bridges may also pose future problems for HSR buses expected to use a new garage planned for the area. But Waite said engineers believe they can improve at least a bit on the current 4.1-metre clearance.
Sometimes, even giving an old bridge a boost is not enough.
The most famous can-opener bridge in North America is a train trestle in Durham, N.C. that sees so many roof-removing crashes it spawned a website, 11foot8.com (an imperial reference to its original height).
Jurgen Henn first set up a camera in 2008 to publicize the dangers of can-opener crashes at the bridge. He has since recorded more than 150 serious crashes and his popular videos are used by truck driver training schools.
In 2019, the owner of the railroad boosted the grade of the tracks and bridge by eight inches — but the crashes continue, Henn said. “Now, at least a lot of the trucks that hit it don’t get totally decapitated.”